Many cities around the world are beginning to develop and implement
"sustainability" projects. These projects typically
include strategies for reducing waste, often by using waste
as raw material for building homes, generating energy, or nourishing
crops, for example. One effective waste-management program can
be found in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Managing Urban Waste: Copenhagen,
Copenhagen has developed a comprehensive program for managing
urban waste. The goals of the program are ambitious:
- 58 percent of the city's household, commercial, and industrial
waste is to be recycled
- 24 percent is to be incinerated
- 18 percent is to be deposited in a landfill
Danish municipalities have the authority to regulate all waste
generated by their local commercial, construction/demolition,
and industrial sectors. Throughout the 1980s, they exercised
this authority mainly by requiring that waste producers to pay
a tax for waste disposal. The waste was shipped to centralized
sorting plant; often the wastes would mix during shipment, making
the sorting process difficult.
To increase the impact of the waste-management system, the
Copenhagen City Council adopted new regulations in 1991 requiring
that waste producers separate all waste at the source of generation.
Hazardous waste must be separated from waste meant for incinerators
or landfills and must be either recycled or treated at specialized
facilities. In addition, waste generators are required to reduce
the volume of waste sent to incinerators or landfills by introducing
new technologies, processes, or recycling measures.
As a result of these regulations, the number of landfills in
use has been reduced from 30 to 3. Today more than 50 percent
of the city's commercial, industrial, and demolition waste is
recycled. Furthermore, about 50,000 tons of combustible waste,
previously deposited in landfills, are now incinerated in plants
that convert waste to energy.
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